Open intents Open Governance

Droidcon London 2011,6 October 2011

Open Governance Index

(by VisionMobile)

Friedger Müffke

@fmdroid#openintents

@fmdroid – Open Governance Index Droidcon London, 7 October 2011

Report

● VisionMobile Ltd.● Author: Liz Laffan, BABS, MA(IPE)● Partially funded by webinos● Android, MeeGo, Linux, Qt, WebKit, Mozilla,

Eclipse and Symbian


Open Governance Index

1.Access

2.Development

3.Derivates

4.Community


Result

● Eclipse 84%

● Linux 71%

● WebKit 68%

● Mozilla 65%

● MeeGo 61%

● Symbian 58%

● Qt 58%

● Android 23%

Open (%)0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

90

AndroidQtSymbianMeeGoMozillaWebKitLinuxEclipse


Access

Access

1. Is source code freely available to all developers, at the same time?

2. Is source code available under a permissive OSI-approved license?

3. Developer support mechanisms – are project mailing lists, forums, bug-tracking databases, source code repositories, developer documentation and developer tools available to all developers?

4. Is the project roadmap available publicly?

5. Transparency of decision mechanisms – are project meeting minutes/discussions publicly available such that it is possible to understand why and how decisions are made relating to the project?


Development

6. Transparency of contributions and acceptance process – is the code contribution and acceptance, process clear, with progress updates of the contribution provided (via Bugzilla or similar)?

7. Transparency of contributions to the project – can you identify from whom source code contributions originated?

8. Accessibility to become a committer – are the requirements and process to become a committer documented, and is this an equitable process

● 9. Transparency of committers – can you identify who committers to the project are?

● 10. Does the contribution license require a copyright assignment, a copyright license or patent grant?


Derivatives

11. Are trademarks used to control how and where the platform is used via enforcing a compliance process prior to distribution?

12. Are go-to-market channels for applications derivatives constrained by the project in terms of approval, distribution or discovery?


Community Structure

13. Is the community structure flat or hierarchical (i.e., are there tiered rights depending on membership status?)


Android

● Access: 9/19

APL 2.0, but private code branch, no roadmap

● Development: 8/18

tools, intransparent contribution process, approvers are Google employees only

● Derivatives: 3/6

pass for CDD + CTS required, approval unclear

● Community: 1/2

no OHA member meetings, etc.


Best practices - Android

● Ease of source-code access via the Apache License

● Ease of access to mailing lists, very good developer tools and forums

● Simple code-contributions process for developers to follow

● Clever targeting of developers via the Android Challenge, Summer of Code, etc.


Practices to avoid - Android

● Unilateral Android project decision-making processes, as Google determines the roadmap, feature-

● set and releases of Android

● Closed code committer process, i.e., committers are exclusively Google personnel

● Closed contributions process model

● Opaque decision-making and control process around the Android Compliance Program

● No project metrics around contributions, commits, contributors, top participants and bugs

● No public information provided regarding meeting minutes or decisions.

● No intention to move towards a more open governance model


Replicant

http://replicant.us

Paul

http://replicant.us/

Open intents Open Governance

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